The European Commission has selected Continua for inclusion in its Smart Personal Healthcare research initiative.
Continua’s European Union Policy Work Group announced that the health interoperability alliance will support the 12-month EU-funded project
Smart Personal Healthcare forms part of the European Commission’s 7th Framework Program for R&D.
Continua joins several organisations, such as ETSI, IHE, empirica and The Centre in receiving funding for the 12-month project. The first workshop is slated to be held in March 2010 in Barcelona, Spain.
"In order to let Europe reap the full benefit of personal health systems, health stakeholders must understand and support the range of challenges in facilitating the interoperability of personal health systems, across technical to organisational and legal aspects," said Mario Romao, co-chair of the Continua working group.
"This initiative – Smart Personal Health – is an activity co-financed by the European Commission that will deliver a series of key awareness raising activities throughout Europe," he said.
Specifically promoting interoperability in personal health and other eHealth systems, Smart Personal Health will include regional stakeholder workshops, a pan-European interoperability conference, and a final report on the status of personal health.
The report’s recommendations will be proposed to the European Commission, European national and regional authorities, stakeholder groups and industry.